Ellen Wagner on the Secret Handshakes of ID

Ellen Wagner has kicked it up a notch. 

Not only has she quoted me talking about naked kids on playgrounds in a new academic journal called the Journal of Applied Instructional Design, but she’s also elevated the conversation regarding the disconnect between Instructional Design degree programs and the real-world of corporate ID.

If you’re interested in ID, read on…

http://www.jaidpub.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/EssayWagnerApr2011.pdf

Kineo Audio Interview with Ellen Wagner "The Evolution of the LMS"

I love my job. I get to talk to really interesting people in the eLearning community and then share it with all of you. Is it work if it's fun?

Last week I got the chance to chat with Ellen Wagner about the eLearning Guild's LMS 2009 Report: The Evolution of the LMS: From Management to Learning.

The big story? The growing impact of Moodle and open source on the maturing LMS market.

Listen to my audio interview with Ellen Wagner over at the Kineo website.

You may already know Ellen from her blog: eLearning Roadtrip. If not, I suggest you join her on her journey.

Will the Real eLearning Industry Please Stand Up?

When we talk about the “industry”, we (and by “we”,  I of course mean those of us in the industry) often refer to it as if it’s this monolithic thing that you can touch. 

The Industry.

Ummm.  Yeah.

So.  What is the eLearning Industry?

Is it the vendors? --  The LMS companies, the custom content developers, the off-the-shelf content creators.

Is it the tools we use to create eLearning?

Is it the companies and people who create those tools? – Adobe, Articulate, Microsoft, etc.

Is it the pundits and bloggers? – the names we know and associate with eLearning – Jay Cross, Ellen Wagner, Tony Karrer, Brent Schlenker, [insert your  name here].

Is it the associations?  -- the eLearning Guild and ASTD.

Is it the research organizations that produce the industry reports?

Is it the companies that give out the awards?

Is it the companies who use eLearning to train their employees?

Is it the Learning & Development/Training departments within all of those companies?

Is it the little companies who don’t even have training departments but still have a lot of training needs?

Is it the schools who use eLearning to teach their students?

Is it the teachers at those schools?

Is it the non-profits who create eLearning for their members?

Is it the institutions that issue the certificates and degrees in ID and whatnot?

Is it the professors who teach at those institutions?  The students who come out of them?

[What did I miss?] 

The point is – and I don’t really know what the point is – the point is, that’s a whole heck of a lot of perspectives. 

The eLearning Industry.

***********

This post  and a few others have been itching to be written for a couple of weeks now.  Since I had the opportunity for a nice schmooze fest after the eLearning Guild ID Symposium in Boston. 

I didn’t attend the sessions, but I DID get to eat a nice Arctic Char at Jasper White’s Summer Shack with the likes of Ellen Wagner, Brent Schlenker, Steve Martin and Kay Wood. 

And then Dave Ferguson incited me further.  He was going to talk about Canada in reference to this rant.  C’mon, Dave.  I dare you.

Photo credit:  Liverpool Street station crowd blur by victoriapeckham

Ellen Wagner: eLearning Roadtrip

Are you an instructional designer or interested in instructional design? Are you reading Ellen Wagner's blog eLearning Roadtrip yet? Well you should be!

The former Senior Director of Worldwide eLearning at Adobe (plus a whole bunch of other impressive sounding gigs), Ellen recently formed Sage Road Solutions.

If I were in charge (but sadly, I'm not), I'd put her in the Who's Who of eLearning.

Start with Ellen's latest post: Prerequisites for IDs in which she eloquently describes all of the OTHER skills one first needs (like writing, presentation skills) before one can even get to the ID work.

Go ahead. Join Ellen on her roadtrip.